Willingham: “power and balance”

The A’s have a lot more pop in their lineup than they did at the start of this week.

Two days after introducing designated hitter Hideki Matsui, the club acquired Washington outfielder Josh Willingham today. Willingham has hit 20-plus homers in three of the past five seasons — and 15 or more in all five — which immediately qualifies him as an honorary Bash Brother in homer-hungry Oakland.

“I’m going to bring some power to the lineup,” Willingham said on a conference call. “I’m not a guy who’s going to go out there and hit 40 homers. … But I’ll bring some power and balance to the lineup, and I also get on base a lot, walk a lot. I think I do a lot of things well.”

Willingham, who turns 32 in February, had 16 homers and 56 RBIs last season for the Nationals. His season was cut short by a knee injury, which required arthoscopic surgery in August and cut his season short. He said he completed rehabilitation in October and is now 100 percent.

General manager Billy Beane made it sound as if he’s not necessarily done dealing. Beane relinquished 100-mph throwing reliever Henry Rodriguez in this trade, along with minor-league outfielder Corey Brown.

“There are still some things we’d like to do, and we have plenty of time,” Beane said. “It doesn’t have to stop here. We just gave up a major-league reliever (Rodriguez), so that’s certainly something we have to look out for.”